The present invention relates to a new and distinct cultivar of Veronica plant of hybrid origin and will be referred to hereinafter by its cultivar name, ‘Tidal Pool’. The new cultivar of Veronica is a hardy herbaceous perennial grown for landscape use.
The new cultivar arose from a breeding program conducted by the Inventors in Glencoe, Ill. The objective was to develop an interspecific hybrid that would combine the desirable traits of both parents (attractive flowers, groundcover growth habit, drought tolerance, etc.) combined with hybrid vigor (e.g. be more vigorous than either parent) as is typical of F1 hybrids, as well as potentially be more adaptable to a clay soil than either of the parent species.
The new cultivar of Veronica arose from a cross made in May 2007 between an unnamed plant of Veronica armena as the female parent and Veronica pectinata ‘Rosea’ (not patented) as the male parent. Flowers of the seed parent were emasculated just after petal expansion but prior to anther dehiscence to prevent self-pollination and the petals were also removed to deter insect visitation to the emasculated flowers. Flowers were then hand-pollinated within 24 hours of emasculation. ‘Tidal Pool’ was selected as a single unique plant from the seedlings derived from the above cross in June 2008.
Asexual reproduction of the new cultivar was first accomplished by shoot tip cuttings by one of the Inventors in June 2008 in Glencoe, Ill. The characteristics of the new cultivar have been found to be stable and to reproduce true to type in successive generations.